Back Again, with a Golden Tip

Yes, I know I've been highly remiss. A month without posting! How time does fly when you're not having fun.

You see, the past few weeks I've been recovering from being glutenized. Yes, it still does happen from time to time, and it seems like the past four weeks have been like a triple whammy of being hit unexpectedly with gluten from sides unseen.

About four weeks ago, I went out to dinner with some friends. As per the usual, I checked with the wait staff and the chef regarding wheat, barley, oats and rye in all that I ordered. All seemed safe, and I exited the restaurant feeling very happy.

Dinner was on a Saturday. Sunday brought with it some tummy rumblings, bloatedness and the beginnings of that grim, "plugged-up" feeling. And on Monday -- there they were again, the sticky, unmoving stools. And it lasted for a few days, before beginning to clear up by the weekend. I realise now that despite my best efforts, people in the dining scene, waiters especially, don't quite know what to look out for when you announce you have to eat wheat-free. I suspect it was not the dishes I ordered, but rather the amuse-bouche that arrived under the radar, as it was the only item whose wheat-free status I hadn't insisted the waiter check with the chef. As it was, when it arrived, and upon my asking, he answered hurriedly "Yes, it doesn't contain wheat... umm, except for this slice of accompanying toast..." It was a small cup of thick soup; I had thought it was thickened with a vegetable puree of sorts, but now...

And then on the following weekend, another dinner with friends. This time it was Chinese food, and I foolishly let a friend order. Among the dishes -- an ominous-looking beef stew, and prawns deep-fried in cereal. (If you don't already know, most western stews are thickened with wheat flour. Chinese ones are less likely to be so, but they do have generous lashings of soy sauce, which does contain gluten. And cereal prawns are usually crumb-coated with oats. Delicious, but deadly for the gluten intolerant.)

I should have known better, but I ate some of the beef, shaken dry of the sauce. And just one of the prawns, scraped as free of the oats they were coated in as much as I could. You see, not eating any of it at all would have been a tremendous loss of face to my friend who had ordered. My fault, for not being clearer about what was off limits for me.

I really should have known better. That dinner was also on a Saturday. Sunday and Monday were spent in bloated, cramping gassiness, stricken again with unmoving constipation.

Then on Tuesday, I had a normal bowel movement. I had a temporary sense of relief, thinking the worst was over, that I hadn't actually ingested that much gluten. How wrong I was!

I know now that it was just my body getting the normal stools, laid down before my gluten attack, out of the way before the main event. Before that Tuesday was over, I had run to the toilet five times, holding my cramping tummy, to sit on the bowl for hours in total. And washing and wiping, washing and wiping after each session, trying in vain to wipe away that which will not be fully wiped away. (Picture the inside of a pipe covered in a sticky sludge, and you'll get the idea why there was always some residue stubbornly overstaying its welcome.)

The next day I had to fly to Kuala Lumpur for business. And if waiters in Singapore are bad, those in KL really are much worse, insofar as understanding of dietary needs are concerned.

"I can't eat wheat."

"You can't eat meat?"

"No, wheat."

"Wit? What?"

"WHEAT. Gandum. Terigu. Mian fen. Gothumai. Atta. Does this contain wheat? Or flour?"

"Er, yes, this has potatoes/rice/liver/vanilla/[add any old gluten-free ingredient here]... so I think you can't eat this right?"

And so on.

So this past week, my diet has been a little erratic. You quiz the restaurant staff, you order food in the food courts and ask that they hold the soy, but really if it's all new terrain you just never know. I just got back to Singapore, and my symptoms over the past few days haven't been that bad, but things aren't really back to normal yet. It could be that an ingestion of gluten takes time to totally clear out from the body, and the length of time depends on the quantity ingested, or the severity of the reaction -- what I mean to say is, what I'm experiencing right now could also be the after effects of my two glutenized weekends previously. But while I really don't know if there was any accidental ingestion of gluten while I was in KL, my gut feeling, ha ha, is that yes there was.

One thing I have noticed -- and here's a tip worth its weight in gold -- the digestive enzyme pills I've been taking really do seem to help. I always have on me my trusty bottle of pills, after reading this tip in Dr. Shari Lieberman's Is Gluten Making Me Ill? You need to take a couple of these, in preparation for any meal that you suspect might sneak a little gluten into your system. Not so effective if taken after said meal, but still better than doing nothing at all.

I took the little green suckers (the brand I buy is "Enzyplex", available at all good pharmacies -- if you know of any other brands do let me know) before that first dinner about four weeks ago. Symptoms after were relatively mild. Relatively. No cramps, but my digestive system was far from normal.

The second weekend, I forgot the pills. And boy did I suffer, cramps and gas and diarrhea and constipation, et al.

This past week, been taking them off and on. And the symptoms are there but milder.

They're not a cure, and you still suffer if you're glutenized, but they do help. A million thanks to Dr. Lieberman. This is one tip I really do treasure.

More tips later...